


Tools That Can Destroy My Heart

by imatrisarahtops



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Caleb Widogast Deserves Nice Things, Developing Relationship, First Kiss, Fluff, Languages, Love Confessions, M/M, What’s sexier than wizards? Nothing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-02
Updated: 2020-02-02
Packaged: 2021-02-28 04:53:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22528162
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imatrisarahtops/pseuds/imatrisarahtops
Summary: For Essek, beauty was this: Caleb with the galaxy of freckles smattered across his pale face, rough stubble that spoke of forgetting to shave, brow furrowed deep in concentration; his shirt collar was off-kilter as he tugged at one side absent-mindedly in thought before returning his fingers to trace over scrawled words on parchment, his shirt sleeves pushed up haphazardly to reveal scarred skin; black ink stained Caleb’s fingers, a matching smudge of it smeared on the side of his nose, and his red hair fell messily from where it had been hastily tied back.And that was how the hushed confession found its way to Essek, a quiet murmur in his native tongue.Essek confesses to Caleb in Undercommon; he doesn’t expect him to recognize the phrase.
Relationships: Essek Thelyss/Caleb Widogast
Comments: 33
Kudos: 460





	Tools That Can Destroy My Heart

**Author's Note:**

> You know when you get into a fandom and you’re like “yeah but I’ll never write fic for it” and then suddenly your hand slips and you’re writing 3,000 words of fluff because you have feelings for soft wizards? Well here I am.
> 
> * * *
> 
> _But now I'm here to give you words_  
>  As tools that can destroy my heart...  
> -“Air Catcher” by twenty one pilots

Essek wasn’t sure exactly when it had happened. Time may be his specialty, but it was the sort of undefinable phenomenon that he felt certain even if he had Caleb’s keen mind and irrefutable memory, he still wouldn’t be able to pinpoint it.

He felt certain, too, that he’d tried to fight it at the start, tried to prevent it from ever happening in the first place. But every moment shared with the human wizard became sacred, as he reveled in the feeling of a kindred spirit, a mind and soul _like his_ , despite thinking the concept near-impossible for so long. He found himself looking forward to every stolen second in the Xhorhaus or in his own laboratory that the two might spend together, whether it just be themselves or in the shared company of the Mighty Nein. It was all precious, something he didn’t take for granted even as a man with so much time at the promise of centuries to come with consecution—every moment held such significance he was sure he would treasure it in every lifetime he had yet to live.

At some point, these quiet moments with Caleb had become _different_. Both of them were so frequently closed off, and yet over time the two had slowly begun to change that, shifting slightly to allow for the smallest displays of comfort—of _affection_.

Gentle touches—fingers brushing against soft skin—hesitant but deliberate—feather-light yet solid and grounding. They were always chaste, innocent in their intention, but still with a certain understood fondness in their meaning. It was something so beautiful to Essek, who had refused for so long to let anyone remotely close, shielding himself incessantly and constructing countless walls to keep anyone and everyone at bay. It was almost funny how easily Caleb seemed to bypass it all, unceremoniously entering his life in the way he had, covered in dirt and bearing a beacon as he claimed to be no friend of the Empire.

For those in Rosohna, beauty was supposed to be the Luxon. It was meant to be clean, straight lines and geometric shapes. It was crisp and clear. It was perfection.

For Essek, beauty was this: Caleb with the galaxy of freckles smattered across his pale face, rough stubble that spoke of forgetting to shave, brow furrowed deep in concentration; his shirt collar was off-kilter as he tugged at one side absent-mindedly in thought before returning his fingers to trace over scrawled words on parchment, his shirt sleeves pushed up haphazardly to reveal scarred skin; black ink stained Caleb’s fingers, a matching smudge of it smeared on the side of his nose, and his red hair fell messily from where it had been hastily tied back.

It was contrary to everything that Essek had been taught to admire and yet it was what he came to revere more than anything else.

Essek found it easy to smile fondly at the sight as they studied, papers scattered across the table to work. They sat adjacent as they worked, poring over parchment and ancient tomes, and Caleb had said something, muttered under his breath as he flourished a hand for a moment as though drawing an invisible sigil in the air with a finger, snatching Essek’s attention away from the desk and forcing it onto him. He didn’t feel the need to restrain himself from lifting a hand and gently brushing away some of the hair that fell into Caleb’s eyes, tucking it behind his ear—and how _freeing_ was that, that he could do that so easily without any fear or judgment, to know he was _permitted_ to touch, that Caleb welcomed it? The man’s lips twitched a little in acknowledgement and appreciation, but didn’t pause in their silent movement, forming around the words Caleb was swiftly reading but not speaking. The human wizard’s focus on the task at hand was unwavering.

And that was how the hushed confession found its way to Essek, a quiet murmur in his native tongue.

At the words, Caleb _froze_. His hand stopped where it was ghosting over one of the papers on the desk, wide blue eyes snapping up to lock onto Essek’s. For a brief moment, it felt as though time itself had stopped, or at least slowed, but Essek quickly realized that wasn’t the case, but instead it was something seizing his chest in the same alarmed disbelief that was all over Caleb’s face.

“W-what?”

The Zemnian swear he’d heard the man utter under his breath instantly entered his mind, something twisting a little like apprehension in his stomach as he mentally cursed. _Scheiße_. He grimaced as he muttered, “I thought you didn’t speak Undercommon.”

Caleb swallowed, glancing away. “I don’t,” he admitted, and Essek could see the color creeping up his cheeks, a rosy pink beneath freckles. “But—ah... Beauregard teasingly told me several phrases.” He smiled a little wryly. “Most of them were, at Jester’s request, rather filthy and untoward. But... but that was one she had mentioned.”

Essek breathed out a laugh, the mild absurdity of it not surprising in the least, knowing the two women all too well. “Of course she did,” he sighed. There was a look on Caleb’s face that he couldn’t quite place, and it made him wary. He took a deep breath and proceeded with caution. “But... it still stands,” he said and Caleb’s gaze caught his again at those words. “I might have intended it not to be understood, but it wasn’t because I had any intention to take it back, nor do I want to apologize for it. I meant it—I _mean_ it. I merely thought... I thought you might not want to hear it so plainly.”

Caleb continued to stare at him with an unreadable expression, and Essek found it hard not to instantly shut him out, to close himself off and slip back into the cool exterior he was so used to presenting. But he’d already learned some time ago that this strange group of adventurers didn’t want that of him—they wanted meals together at the kitchen table in the Xhorhaus and mindless chatter over Caduceus’s tea and his feet on the ground instead of floating. So despite his instinct, Essek fought the urge to try to protect himself from the possible rejection, laying himself bare for Caleb instead.

“Would you...” Caleb said softly, as though he wasn’t sure of the words himself. “Would you say it in Common, then? If you mean it?”

Essek hadn’t expected the request, and it made his heart stutter, stammering against his rib cage. He couldn’t deny the human, though—he’d realized that some time between secretly teaching him Dunamancy and teleporting the Mighty Nein all over Wildemount. Refusing was never an option when it came to Caleb, even when it defied all logic and reason and went against everything he had once thought, and maybe that should have clued Essek in much earlier as to just how strongly he felt.

“I love you, Caleb.”

Caleb closed his eyes, exhaling shakily at the admission. Essek wondered if he wanted to hear the words in Common just to be sure that Beauregard hadn’t offered him false information in her sibling-like teasing. Whatever the reason was, it didn’t matter, because Essek had no issue telling him the truth, even if it made his pulse thrum with nerves.

Caleb nodded once to himself, as though it was a confirmation, corroborating what Beauregard had said with Essek’s own confession. His expression, however, remained the same, and Essek couldn’t decipher its meaning. Still, he could see that the look in his eyes wasn’t cold, but uncertain. He saw the familiar pain he’d recognized there what felt like so long ago.

“I know you think yourself not worthy of love,” Essek told him softly, hesitantly reaching forward to cover one of Caleb’s hands with his own. Caleb didn’t visibly react to the words, but that in itself seemed to assure Essek that he’d pinpointed the source of the other man’s uneasiness. “And I know, too, that your companions have similarly tried to prove you wrong.” He allowed himself a small smile.

Caleb turned his hand beneath his, letting his palm face up and press against his, fingertips gently tracing over his wrist. “Trying to dissuade them has been fruitless,” he agreed with a sigh and a soft smile that matched Essek’s.

“I know I’ve pointed out before how like-minded we are,” Essek continued. “But this is where we are complete opposites.” Caleb frowned, looking up at the drow in uncertainty, but now Essek’s focus was on where he brought up his other hand to clasp Caleb’s in both of his own. “Your attempts at isolation are an effort to keep others from getting close enough to love you. Mine have always been a barrier to protect my own heart, to prevent myself from getting close enough to anyone to love _them_.”

He brushed his thumbs over the back of Caleb’s hand, glancing up once more to meet his gaze. “I suppose in that regard, though, we complement each other.” He squeezed Caleb’s hand. “And despite both of our best efforts, it has happened regardless.”

The other man let out a breath, shaking his head slightly. Essek waited, letting him sort out what he wanted to say, giving him a moment to take in the words before responding with his own.

“How?” Caleb asked after a few seconds of silent consideration, his free hand reaching up to scratch at the patterned web of scars on his arm. The movement was subconscious but a little frenzied, Caleb glancing away as his expression twisted into a grimace. “How can you, even—even after knowing what I am?”

Essek disentangled one of his hands to instead reach out and grasp Caleb’s other. The man startled a little at the touch, as though suddenly made aware of what he was doing. He let Essek guide his hand away, drawing it to where their others were joined on the table and settling them beside each other. Caleb’s eyes followed the movement, and Essek let his gaze fall there as well.

“Yes, I know who you were trained to be,” Essek said, choosing each of the words carefully because he knew their weight and implications and knew that Caleb was clever enough to catch them as well— _who_ , _not_ _what_ — _past tens_ e— _not out of his own volition_. “But Caleb, I love you not in spite of, but rather because of all the things that have made you who you are. I don’t pretend to believe in fate or destiny, but I’ve studied time and its workings enough to see how each seemingly insignificant cause has an effect. Every moment in your past has led you to _this_ moment, and it is one where you are loved not only by me, but by all of your friends. Love is not conditional, and who you are now is very much worth loving, despite what you may think of yourself and the wrongs you see as so unforgivable.”

Essek watched as Caleb closed his eyes, seemingly to collect his thoughts once more. The man swallowed thickly, inhaled sharply through his nose, and furrowed his brow as so often he did when trying to mentally sort through information, working out a puzzle to be solved.

“I—I know that I don’t get to dissuade you,” Caleb said carefully, opening his eyes but keeping his gaze low, trained on where his fingers tensed beneath Essek’s. “Beauregard has made that clear to me before.” The man smiled grimly as though recalling the memory.

“But...” Caleb’s whole body seemed to pull taut, shoulders hunching as he folded in on himself ever so slightly. Essek could tell he wanted to withdraw his hands, probably to scratch at the itch he knew didn’t actually exist beneath the skin of his arms. Instead, Essek gave his fingers a reassuring squeeze, a reminder of where he was, to keep his mind from drifting too far into his past.

Caleb swallowed and then began again. “But loving me is a curse,” he breathed out, a bite to the words as though they were bitter venom on his tongue. “It’s a Hunter’s Mark cast upon you, making you the quarry of enemies that are not your own.”

“But they are,” Essek argued without a moment’s thought. “If they are your enemies, then they are just as much mine, as they are of the entire Mighty Nein. They are all prepared to fight your battles with you, as am I.”

Caleb shook his head. “But you _shouldn’t_ be,” he said, squeezing his eyes shut. He sounded a little distraught, but Essek caught the resignation in his voice as well. “But I’ve been told countless times that that choice isn’t mine to make.”

“Your friends are, admittedly, wise,” Essek said, relieved when he earned a small smile at the teasing remark.

“ _Our_ friends,” Caleb reminded him in a whisper, some of the tension in his body finally melting away in reluctant acceptance. “They are quite taken by you as well.”

“And I, them,” Essek agreed gently. “Yet of them all, I love you, Caleb.”

Caleb’s eyes met his once more, uncertainty still shimmering beneath their surface, and he wetted his lips with his tongue. He opened his mouth and shut it several times in quick succession. “I—I-I...”

“It isn’t a _question_ ,” Essek told him. “There is no answer required, nor is it expected. It is an admission, a statement of how _I_ feel, and you needn’t respond in any way that you do not wish.”

Essek watched as Caleb’s throat worked through swallowing, watched as his eyes softened into something earnest instead of wary, watched as he leaned closer just the _smallest_ amount, but it was something that never went unnoticed—not when it was between two people who were so reluctant to let others near, a tiny movement that held monumental meaning—to want to close that gap even just a hair’s breadth meant far too much to _ever_ go unnoticed.

“And if I do wish?” Caleb asked.

The question in and of itself was enough for Essek, again sending his pulse racing, heart fluttering like a captured butterfly in his chest. But he knew that wasn’t the answer Caleb was seeking.

“Then there’s a multitude of ways to do so,” Essek said instead. “I believe I have said it to you numerous times before, even before speaking the words in Undercommon.”

Essek withdrew one hand, reaching up to brush back some of Caleb’s hair again, letting his fingers trail along Caleb’s face. “I say it when I touch you like this despite keeping a distance from everyone else,” he told him, voice a little shaky in a way he did not recognize, unable to hide behind his mask of cool confidence as he so often did in court. “I say it when our eyes meet when working through a spell I would entrust to no one else. I say it when I choose not to be _Shadowhand to the Bright Queen_ before you and yours, all displays and pretenses and significance stripped away until I am just _Essek_ —until I am nobody, and yet that is still who you all wish to have in your company.”

He paused. “There are more ways I wish to say it,” he said, butterfly wings flapping incessantly, his heart threatening to pound out of his chest with boldness he ought not have, all false bravado. Caleb looked up at him curiously and Essek found the courage to press on.

He raised the hands that were still entwined, flattening Caleb’s palm over his chest, just above where his heart was beating so erratically. “I can say it through the way my heart refuses to behave normally, the mere thought of you sending it into a frenzy.”

Essek paused again, letting Caleb take in the feeling, to mentally record the erratic pulse beneath his palm. After a moment, he inched forward. The movement caught Caleb’s attention, and his gaze shifted from where their hands were pressed, instead meeting Essek’s eyes. “If you are amenable,” he said quietly, lifting his hand once more to Caleb’s face, this time to gently press against his stubbled jaw, “I can say it like this.”

He leaned closer, slowly but deliberately, giving Caleb every opportunity to object. When the man didn’t, instead closing his eyes and similarly shifting forward in anticipation, Essek closed the final gap and kissed him. It was brief and chaste, just a simple press of lips, sweet and innocent. Still, it made Essek’s pulse stutter beneath Caleb’s hand, the man’s fingers pressing more firmly against the fabric of his tunic in response.

He pulled back only a few inches, watching Caleb’s lashes flutter slightly before his eyes opened, blinking back at Essek.

“I wish to say it in every language possible,” Essek murmured. “Because perhaps then you might grasp just how much it is that I do love you.”

Caleb’s eyes searched his face for a moment, and Essek felt exposed. His heart had been handed over to Caleb, now, and he had no intention of taking it back. Essek wasn’t sure if he’d ever willingly opened himself up in such a way before, making himself so vulnerable, tearing down each and every wall and barrier that he had placed there himself.

But even then, Essek felt no heaviness of fear, but instead a relieved weightlessness, freed as he revealed himself so plainly to Caleb.

After a moment, the human leaned forward, letting his forehead rest against his.

“I-I...” Caleb stammered, before taking a breath to order his thoughts. “ _Ich... ich habe mich auch in dich verliebt._ ”

Essek didn’t need to speak Zemnian to understand the emotion behind the words; instead, he felt it with his entire being, coursing through his veins and reaching every extremity, a certainty to the words that matched his own confession earlier despite the language in which they were spoken.

He again closed that space between them to find soft lips, a press more confident and assured now than it had been before. He smiled into it; he couldn’t help himself—he let his lips part into a grin against Caleb’s, the strange sensation making the other man follow suit. Essek lifted both hands to cradle Caleb’s face, feeling the smile he wore beneath his palms, reveling in the idea that he helped cause that smile.

Essek didn’t pretend to know what the consequences of this might be, didn’t even care to think about what might transpire as a result. Every cause had an effect, hundreds and thousands of potential outcomes from every fragment of possibility. But just for a moment, he let himself exist only then—because if each choice they had made had somehow brought each of them together, then he was not going to waste it.


End file.
